Hugo Alexander Speer is an English actor and director.
Life and career
Hugo Speer was born in Harrogate in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and educated at the localHarrogate Grammar School. He studied acting at the Arts Educational Schools, London. Speer began his acting career appearing in the TV seriesMcCallum, The Bill, and Heartbeat. He played a minor role in the film Bhaji on the Beach before his first notable appearance as Guy in the film The Full Monty. Following this film's worldwide success he went on to appear in Swing, Deathwatch and The Interpreter. However, most of his work has been on TV, including sitcom Men Behaving Badly, dramas Clocking Off, The Last Detective, Boudica, and The Rotters' Club, as well as the 2005 BBC adaptation of Dickens'Bleak House. In 2006, he appeared in the postal worker drama Sorted. In 2008, he starred alongside Martine McCutcheon in Echo Beach. In 2011 he played a repairman whose repairs "come to life" in the supernatural drama Haven, based on a Stephen King story. Speer also provides narration for ITV series, Cops with Cameras, Channel 5's The Bachelor, Channel 4 series and the BBC series Seaside Rescue. He appears as John Foster in the penultimate and final episodes of the fourth series of Skins. In 2002 he starred as Sergeant David Tate in the film Deathwatch, a 2002 European horror film directed by Michael J. Bassett. Hugo Speer also narrated a factual programme on Discovery HD called Gold Divers, and. Since 2010 he has played the lead character of DCI John Stone in eight series of the BBC Radio 4police dramaStone. From 2013 to 2014 he starred as Inspector Valentine in the new version of Father Brown on BBC TV in the first series and the first episode of the second series. He made a return appearance in the 2020 episode 8.10 "The Tower of Lost Souls" Starting in 2014, Speer starred as Captain Treville in The Musketeers. The series ended in 2016. Since 2018 he plays the character Lucius in the historical fantasy drama series Britannia, which is produced by Sky Atlantic and Amazon Prime.
On 19 February 2015, Speer married Glaswegian actress, writer and director Vivienne Harvey. In 2009, Speer was involved in a car accident that saw him crash his BMW into a traffic island while driving after drinking over the legal limit. He was returning from a wake. No one was hurt in the incident and Speer was banned from driving for eighteen months. Speer moved to London after his success in The Full Monty and lived there for fifteen years but moved back to his native North Yorkshire. His pastimes include falconry, walking and music. He is a supporter of Leeds United. He is friends with fellow actor Andrew Scarborough, whom he worked with in the Hearts and Bones for two series. Speer and Scarborough have known each other since they were children.
